More Caltrans Building coverage

DOWNTOWN LOS ANGELES — Kevin Roderick over at the great LA Observed made mention of the new Caltrans Building today. He links to a Daily News story asking how Caltrans can get this building done on-time and on-budget when they’re unable to do the same for freeway projects.

Kevin also links to an Archinect thread that has some photos of the building. In addition to just being better photos than my Caltrans Building photos, they also give some shots of the building interior. I don’t think they do the exterior justice, however, since they don’t back up enough to convey the building’s mass, or the intimidating presence it presents to the street-level.

Forget the debate about the building’s environmental features or whether Caltrans should have thrown so much money into it (both the green features and the money are good things in my book), let’s just get right down to what’s important: who really thinks all this Thom Mayne stuff looks good? The only other work of his I’m seen up close is the new LAUSD Science Center school in Exposition Park, and while the interior of the redone Armory building looks very cool, the exterior of the new classroom space just looks like typical Mayne, without really having any regard for all the classic structures the park contains.